|
Ela's daughter imitates her mother by putting her own doll in a sling on her back.
|
I spent a year travelling in Africa, and there I observed that every baby is carried all the time. The women would never dream of putting their babies down, as they worry that they would be eaten by snakes or that some other danger would befall them. Camping in a remote village in Zimbabwe I observed how every day, women from the village 30Kms away would walk, with their babies tied on their backs and baskets of vegetables on their heads, all the way to our camp.
The women sat with us all day and then spent the evenings singing and dancing around the camp fire. They never put the babies down even when they were dancing! And the babies never complained about such "rough" treatment, they were quite content to be bounced around on the backs of their energetic mothers.
Babies instinctively feel the fear of being alone.
Even though we live in "civilised" cities and towns, babies don?t yet know that it is safe to be alone in our cultural environment. So is it fair for a newborn who has not yet developed skills to deal with fear, to be without human contact in her or his developing months? Many people protest that they are always in the same room with the baby, or "within earshot," but to a newborn, if she can't see you, or feel you physically, you aren't there, and even "just one minute" is like an eternity to a small baby who wakes up to find herself alone.
My daughter, Sequoia, was born in Brazil, and there only the Amazonian tribal people still carry their babies in a sling. The 'civilised' city-dwellers often thought I was crazy when they saw me carrying Sequoia in a sling. They would tell me "she can't breathe in there" or "you will drop her." The truth is you can't drop a baby tied properly into a sling, because you aren't actually holding the baby with your hands, the sling is supporting her completely.
As a part of human evolution, it makes a lot of sense for a baby to be carried all the time.
When early hominids stood up and became Homo sapiens, our pelvis became too narrow to birth a fully-developed child. When our babies are born they haven?t really finished the natal development period. They need to continue this development once outside the womb. The best way to do this is to carry the baby in a sling, like a kangaroo with her Joey in her pouch.
Being carried close to the body means that the baby still feels the movement of her mother and the warmth of her body, hears the sound of her heartbeat, breath and voice just as she did in the womb. The baby feels comforted, wanted, and safe. Being close to the parent's body rhythms helps the baby to regulate her own rhythms. Babies who are carried show a much lower incidence of apnoeas (stop-breathing) and SIDS. They tend to gain weight faster, sleep better and cry less.
Some Western social trends dictate that if a baby is carried too much, she will be 'spoilt.'
When my daughter was first born, I carried her in my arms most of the time, but I was forever trying to put her down. As soon as she fell asleep, I would try to put her on the bed and I was spending so much energy to get her out of my hands. Finally I realised that I wasn't meant to put her down, and I started learning to tie my daughter in a sling. Like a miracle, she stopped being so fussy and colicky.
Sometimes parents are advised to "let the baby cry and sort herself out." This kind of attitude is supposed to help the baby to learn to fulfil its' own needs. However, in my opinion, a newborn has but few needs, and she is totally incapable of fulfilling any of them. Carrying the baby at all times means that the baby's most vital needs of having comfort and closeness are fulfilled, instantly. The baby is free to look around and observe the world and free to fall asleep when she is tired and to wake up already in the arms of her caregiver.
The advantages of carrying your baby
Research shows that being carried helps a baby to develop better muscle tone and circulation. A baby is far more comfortable sitting on the body of a parent than tucked 'comfortably' into a soft bed. Try spending a long time in bed all day every day. After a while, your muscles begin to ache, you want to stretch and flex your body and you may feel achy and agitated.
When a baby is carried, her body moves naturally with the movement of the parent, helping her to keep her muscular and cardiovascular systems active. Babies who are carried develop the muscles for sitting, standing and walking sooner, and recent studies show that babies who are carried have increased brain function over babies who lie down all day.
In a sling a baby is at eye and voice level, and hears and sees what is going on around her. The baby becomes part of the action, not the centre of attention. I always tied Sequoia into the sling when I had work to do like cleaning the house and she loved it. I never put her down until she asked to get down herself, which was when she started to crawl. Now, at two and a half years old, she still goes in a sling on my back when we go out, and occasionally around the house if she's feeling sleepy or needy.
Babies who are carried, even for a few extra hours a day, become less clingy because they feel confident and secure, and surprisingly they often initiate separation from their mother sooner because their need to have comfort and closeness is met. Quite the opposite of being 'spoilt,' they are fulfilled.
Ela Forest is a natural parenting consultant, rebirthing practitioner and does intuitive healing and massage using reiiki, aura balancing, meditation, cleansing and Gestalt. She gives workshops on women's health and fertiility and practices as a lay Doula and breastfeeding consultant. She has travelled extensively with her two and a half year old daughter, Sequoia.